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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Yo-Kai Express

Yo-Kai to Debut Boba Making Robot at CES 2024

In less than two weeks, Yo-Kai Express, a company that’s become synonymous with hot ramen-making robots, will show it has a sweet side with the debut of a boba-making robot at CES in Las Vegas.

Yo-Kai CEO Andy Lin told The Spoon that the company’s new robotic boba maker will be the first boba-bot that incorporates a cooking pot inside the appliance, enabling it to cook boba tapioca pearls as well as other toppings. According to Lin, the machine’s built-in cooking capability will allow it to be more than just a boba-maker, enabling it to create a variety of different hot and cold beverages and meals ranging from instant oatmeal to protein shakes to soups and coffees.

The first machine will be shipped to Netflix’s headquarters in Los Gatos, California. After that, Lin says that distribution will be a phased release with around ten boba-bots shipped to other corporate headquarters in the Bay Area. Another shipment in March will put the Yo-Kai boba machine at college campuses and other locations, and starting in June, the Yo-Kai boba-bot will be widely available to individual operators who want to operate a Yo-Kai.

And it’s with this wider availability that Yo-Kai will begin a new expansion approach that will extend beyond its current operating model. Lin says that in 2024, the company plans to phase its expansion model into one utilizing a partner model where individual operators will pay an initial startup fee to Yo-Kai, and from there, they will be able to take ownership of the boba and begin operating it. Lin says that the model, which is “franchise-like”, will offer new operators a choice of up to 1,500 different locations that Yo-Kai has helped find through a new strategic partnership with a large real estate management company.

“Usually, if a partner wants to open a boba store, they need to find a location by themselves,” said Lin. “But we don’t need them to find a location; we can actually provide a location to them. So it will be a one-stop-shop: Go to the website, select the region you want to have the machine, and we will work together with them.”

While the Yo-Kai boba-bot certainly isn’t the first automated boba-making machine, no other company has had much success in expanding beyond initial pilots and trials. Bobacino, which debuted in 2020, saw its CEO depart last month, and it’s not clear if the company is still operational. Cloutea, which debuted its boba robot at CES 2023, opened a store in Las Vegas this past April but has not expanded beyond a single location.

The new Yo-Kai boba robot will debut at CES, which starts on January 9th and runs through January 12th. The new boba bot will be featured in the food tech area on the show floor in the Venetian Expo Hall at CES.

Stay tuned to The Spoon for more food tech coverage at CES over the next two weeks.

Yo-Kai To Debut Desktop Ramen Robot For Space-Constrained Retail Formats at CES 2023

Yo-Kai Express, a startup that makes autonomous ramen robots, will debut its latest model at CES, a desktop ramen-making machine targeted at small-format retailers such as gas stations and co-working spaces.

The new machine, called the YKE Desktop, is a semi-automatic cooking machine that makes a bowl of ramen in 90 seconds. The machine is paired with an RFID-enabled freezer that holds up to 24 bowls of ramen.

“We are pleased to debut our new product : Yo-Kai Desktop, the new terminal with a smaller form factor, which can be installed anywhere – remote office, gas station, convenience stores, co-working space,” said Andy Lin, founder and CEO of Yo-Kai Express. “It’s a semi-automated machine that provides our customers more flexibility.”

In addition to showing off its newest model at CES, the company will demo a new app that enables customers to order ramen remotely. The app, which will be released to the public in the spring, allows customers to earn loyalty points, discounts, and rewards.

The news follows a busy fall for Yo-Kai, in which they expanded throughout Japan, raised additional funding, and partnered with the Japanese robotics giant Softbank to enable an integration with server robot Pepper.

For those interested in checking out the new Yo-Kai machine, they will be in the Food Tech Pavilion at CES at booth 53114.

Yo-Kai’s Ramen Robot Heads to Japan

Two things I always make sure I do when visiting Japan are 1) eat ramen and 2) buy things from some of the wonderful variety of vending machines found most everywhere across the country.

However, despite my love for these two things, I have never combined them, only because buying freshly made ramen from a vending machine was not possible in Japan…until now.

That all changes this week. Yo-Kai, the California-based maker of robotic fresh ramen vending machines, has debuted the country’s first ramen-making robot at the Haneda airport in Tokyo. According to the announcement, the new Yo-Kai machine is located in Terminal 2 at Haneda and will serve up ramen with four types of miso in 90 seconds for 790 yen ($6.55).

Japan is recognized as the vending machine capital of the world, where customers can buy everything from grilled fish to chocolate-covered superworms by inserting coins or tapping their phones. By being the first company to bring a fresh-ramen making robot to Japan, Yo-Kai could have a huge opportunity in front of it

Yo-Kai founder Andy Lin seems to agree. In a post on Linkedin, Lin says Yo-Kai’s presence in Japan was in the works for some time and hints the ramen machine could show up in other locations soon.

“More exciting news will be announced soon!”

Since I’ll be back in Japan in August for our annual Smart Kitchen Summit Japan, it looks like I’ll have to head over to Haneda to combine my love of these two distinctly Japanese specialties.

Is the College Market Back in Session? Yo-Kai Express Installs Machines at U. of Arizona

Yo-Kai Express is heading off to college to feed hot ramen to hungry students. Over the weekend, company founder and CEO Andy Lin posted a picture on Linkedin of Yo-Kai’s newest vending machine installation at the University of Arizona.

In a follow up email sent to The Spoon, Yo-Kai COO Amanda Tsung said that the company now has 25 machines live. The hot ramen vending kiosks are located across corporate campuses, hotels, retail locations, airports and now, colleges. The University of Arizona will actually be getting two additional Yo-Kais once students and faculty return.

In addition to the University of Arizona, Yo-Kai has installations going in at the University of California at San Francisco Medical Center Parnassus and the University of San Diego. Machines will accept student dining programs as a form a payment.

College campuses were becoming quite the hot spot for automated vending machines like Chowbotics and Blendid prior to the pandemic. Colleges are a good target location for unattended vending machines because they have a sizable population of students that don’t necessarily constrain their mealtimes to normal daylight hours. Vending machines can operate around the clock, and have the ability nowadays to serve up pretty complex food like ramen and grain bowls.

Yo-Kai could be a canary in the coalmine — a sign that the college campus market could be back in play for automated vending companies. With overall infection rates in the U.S. declining (knocks on wood) and vaccine efforts ramping up, students going back to college in the fall could mark a return to “normal” (whatever that will actually mean).

Relatedly, last month the San Francisco Airport gave the go-ahead to Cafe X to reopen its robot barista in the Terminal 3 location as foot traffic there ticked back up. Airports, too, could once again be a more thriving location for vending machines as travel increases.

For those vending startups that have successfully weathered the COVID-19 storm thus far, this should be welcome news that more opportunities lie ahead.

Here are the Kitchen Robots We Saw at CES & Food Tech Live 2021

One thing I miss most about heading to Vegas every January for CES is walking the basement of the Sands convention center. There, in the startup area known as Eureka Park, I’ll wander for hours and get lost amongst thousands of exhibitors in search of a few undiscovered food tech gems.

I usually find a few and, since we’re talking CES, they sometimes come in the form of a food robot.

From there, I usually head across the street to Treasure Island where The Spoon has its own product showcase during CES week called Food Tech Live, where I can also get my fill of food robots while also doing such things as eating a cookie with my face on it.

While both CES and Food Tech Live didn’t take place in person in Sin City this year, that doesn’t mean there weren’t some cool food robots to check out at their virtual versions last week. Below is our roundup of home food robots I found at virtual CES and The Spoon’s annual first-of-the-year product showcase, Food Tech Live.

Moley Robotic Kitchen

Since 2015, the Moley robotic kitchen has captured the imagination of the tech journalists and robotics industry with its robot chef concept that can that can prepare full meals from prep to cook to clean up with a pair of articulating robot arms.

And while we’ve yet to actually see the Moley cook a full meal from start to finish, the system’s inventor told The Spoon that it’s finally on sale and will find its first home in 2021. The company, which had a virtual booth at CES 2021 and debuted a bunch of new highlight videos, will sell both a home and pro version of its robotic kitchen. Prices for the fully robotic kitchen will be about $335 thousand.

The Moley Robotic Kitchen System at CES 2021

Oliver

Else Labs Oliver is a single-pot cooking robot that dispenses fresh ingredients and automates the cooking process with the help of temperature sensing and machine vision capabilities.

Else Labs, which went on sale via Indiegogo last fall, was on display at Food Tech Live last week. The product’s inventor and company CEO Khalid Aboujassoum says the major difference between Oliver and other guided cooking appliances on the market is Oliver pretty much handles the entire cooking process for you.

“The Oliver can do unattended stovetop cooking,” Aboujassoum told me last fall when the product went on sale.

Oliver, the smart cooking robot

iWonderCook

The iWonderCook is a automated cooking machine that cooks one-pot meals. The meals are provided in the form of the company’s own meal kit service, which the user orders through the device’s touchscreen. From there, as can be seen in the video below, the user inserts a bowl, embeds the food “cartridge”, and then adjusts the amount of oil and water needed.

I haven’t gotten a chance to see the iWondercook in action or taste the food, I will say is the product’s reliance on its own meal kits might be a turn-off for some users.

iWONDERCOOK robotic chef does the cooking for you.

Yo-Kai Express Takumi

Technically the new Yo-Kai Express Takumi home ramen machine is something closer to a Keurig for food than a food robot, it’s worth looking at this machine given the company’s smart vending roots.

The Takumi, which debuted at Food Tech Live last week, follows Yo-Kai’s move into the home market with its home delivery service. The Takumi takes the frozen ramen bowls, which are centrally produced in Yo-Kai’s California facilities, and steams and reconstitutes the ramen in just a few minutes.

The company has plans to not only to start selling ramen to users in the office and home, but on the go with an autonomous ramen delivery cart.

Day With Yo Kai Final

Samsung Bot Handy

Samsung announced a trio of home robots aimed at helping humans around the house. The one that was most interesting when it comes to lending a hand in the kitchen was Bot Handy, a mobile bot with large articulating hand that can help with anything from pouring a glass of wine to doing the dishes.

It’s worth noting that Samsung – like many big consumer electronics brands – has a history of showing off cool new product prototypes at CES that are more conceptual than anything close to actually coming to market, including last year’s they showed off a Moley-kitchen style robot system. Let’s hope the Bot Handy is something the company delivers on.

Julia

The Julia is another single-pot home cooking robot that allows the user to set it and forget it for pretty much an entire meal. The Julia is made by a Nymble, an Indian-based startup with plans to start selling the product in 2021. Nymble CEO Raghav Gupta showed off the product at Food Tech Live, told us that they are expanding their alpha trial program in the United States in February.

ColdSnap

Like the Takumi, the ColdSnap isn’t quite a full-fledged food robot, but something closer to a Bartesian style automated appliance that makes cold ice cream (as well as frozen margaritas and smoothies). While we weren’t able to get our hands on the ColdSnap, the company gave CNET a hands-on preview of the appliance and the editors were impressed. The appliance, which is going to a fairly spending $500-1,000, reminds me of the Wim fro-yo appliance that never made it to market after an acqui-hire of the founding by Walmart.

Exclusive: Yo-Kai Express to Launch Autonomous Mobile Vending Machine and Countertop Cooking Device

Yo-Kai Express, which started out as a robotic ramen vending machine, is expanding its offerings with the addition of a mobile, self-driving version of its vending machine as well as a countertop cooking device in 2021. Yo-Kai Founder and CEO, Andy Lin, announced the new products during my fireside chat with him at the Smart Kitchen Summit: Japan last night.

Both moves are part of a larger push by Yo-Kai to transform itself into a broader platform. As Lin explained it, Yo-Kai is assembling the pieces so users can get hot ramen wherever they are, whenever they want.

One of the ways it is doing this is by making its vending machines mobile. Lin said that Yo-Kai has been working on a self-driving version of its vending machine. This autonomous restaurant-on-wheels will eventually be able to drive on certain routes and stop when hailed by a mobile phone and, Lin said, even when a person waves at it while the machine passes by.

That vision is still a ways off, but Lin said the first version of this self-driving ramen machine is already being manufactured and should debut at the end of Q1 2021/beginning of Q2. Yo-Kai is currently in talks with the Universities of California at Berkeley and Irvine to have the machine operate on those campuses. Going the college route makes sense for Yo-Kai, as it helps the company sidestep some of the regulatory hurdles around self-driving vehicles on public city streets. This is the same path that Starship took with its autonomous delivery robots.

The mobile machine is just one of many different, err, vehicles Yo-Kai is adopting to dispense its hot ramen. The company is also working on machines built for small or large offices, as well as your kitchen counter. Last night, Lin also unveiled Yo-Kai’s new Takumi, a new cooking device for the home.

The Takumi ties in with the line of mail-order ramen that Yo-Kai launched earlier this year. Currently, Yo-Kai mails out ramen kits that you have to assemble; they take about 15 minutes to fully prepare. In its next iteration, the ramen will be made, frozen and shipped to you in a single-serve container. Users will put the container into the Takumi, which uses steam to reconstitute and heat the ramen in just a few minutes.

In addition to offering more ways to get ramen, Yo-Kai is also opening up its platform to offer customers ramen from different restaurants. Yo-Kai is currently in talks to co-brand and sell meals from well-known ramen houses in Japan. Yo-Kai will work with these restaurants to recreate thos ramen restaurant recipes in Yo-Kai kitchens. Those meal will then be sold via branded ramen machines, and they will also be sold by mail order to consumers, who can cook it in their Takumi.

We’ve seen this type of co-branding elsewhere with automated vending services. Blendid, which makes a smoothie making robot, recently announced a co-branding deal with Jamba, and Chowbotics partnered with Saladworks on a salad making robot. Co-branding will likely be the main strategy for vending services going forward, as it leverages the brand recognition of a well-known restaurant, rather than trying to build up the robot company’s brand.

As Lin explained to me when I first met him last year, in Japanese folklore, Yo-Kais are ghosts that can appear anywhere at any time. With its forthcoming moves, Yo-Kai Express’ ramen will be doing much the same thing.

Yo-Kai Express Adding Boba Dessert to its Machine and Meal Kit

Pretty soon, you’ll be able to get more than just ramen from Yo-Kai Express vending machines and meal kits. Yo-Kai Founder and CEO, Andy Lin, shared on Linkedin today that his company will be adding a frosty dessert to its menus.

The Yo-Kai “signature snow ice,” Lin wrote, consists of “Himalayan salt whip cream with brown sugar boba black milk tea.” No specific timeframe was mentioned but Lin said the dessert would be available in Yo-Kai machines and home meal kits “soon.”

We reached out to Lin to fill in some details and will update the post when those arrive. Overall, this marks another bit of expansion for the vending machine startup.

When we first started covering Yo-Kai, its automated vending machines served hot ramen to customers in high-traffic areas like malls, airports and corporate campuses. But as the pandemic hit the U.S., those locations saw fewer and fewer people.

So, if people can’t come to you, you may as well go directly to them. In April of this year, Yo-Kai started selling ramen meal kits that ship directly to consumers’ doors (if you live on the West Coast).

Like the meal kits, the addition of a cool dessert isn’t too much of a surprise either. Once made, Yo-Kai’s bowls of ramen are frozen and stored that way inside the vending machine before being reheated. A similar, pre-made frosty snow ice dessert in a bowl seems like a pretty easy thing for the Yo-Kai machine to dispense as well.

It should also be noted that according to the Yo-Kai website, two of its machines are installed at Milk Tea labs in San Francisco and San Jose. So offering a boba/black milk tea doesn’t seem like that much of a stretch.

As I’ve written before, I’m all-in on vending machines (and wrote an extensive report on them for Spoon Plus Subscribers), in part because of their ability to offer really good food, from a very compact space around the clock. While I haven’t had the chance to test out Yo-Kai’s snow ice dessert, given how much I liked their ramen meal kit, it’s hard to imagine them making their first foray into desserts a bad one.

The Great Vending Reinvention: The Spoon’s Smart Vending Machine Market Report

Thanks to advances in hardware, the internet of things, and food preparation, vending machines today are basically restaurants in a box. They offer high-end cuisine in minutes, require minimal setup time, and have the on-board computing smarts to manage inventory and communicate any issues that arise.

With these capabilities, it’s no wonder the vending machine category was valued at more than $30 billion in 2018, according to Grandview Research, and was anticipated to have a CAGR of 9.4 percent from 2019 through 2025.

Had this report been written even just a few months ago, the main takeaway would have been that vending machines are perfect for high-traffic areas that operate around the clock: airports, corporate offices, college dorms, and hospitals.

But we’re living in a world continuously being shaped and reshaped by the COVID-19 global pandemic. Right now, some form of shelter-in-place orders blanket most of the U.S. Global air travel volume has plummeted, so airports are not busy. Non-essential businesses are closed and people are working from home, not office buildings. And colleges may not hold in-person classes until 2021.

While on the surface, those factors suggest vending machine companies will be yet-another sector wiped out by coronavirus, there has actually never been a better time for the automated vending machine industry. The small footprint and high-end food these devices offer are perhaps more important than ever at a time when minimizing human-to-human contact in foodservice is paramount to doing business. That makes the vending machine market uniquely positioned to capitalize on a post-pandemic world.

This report will define what the automated vending machine space is, list the major players, and present the challenges and opportunities for the market going forward.

Companies profiled in this report include Alberts, API Tech/Smart Pizza, Basil Street, Blendid, Briggo, Byte Technology, Cafe X, Chowbotics, Crown Coffee, Farmer’s Fridge, Fresh Bowl, Le Bread Xpress, Macco Robotics, TrueBird, and Yo-Kai Express.

This research report is exclusive for Spoon Plus members. You can learn more about Spoon Plus here.

I Tried Yo-Kai’s Ramen Meal Kit, and Now I Have to Move to California

“This is amazing!” That was my 9-year old son raving in between big juicy slurps of his Black Garlic Tonkatsu ramen that I had just whipped up for him.

This five star review was soon followed by my wife, who after trying the Spicey Kimchi ramen I also made this afternoon, said “That’s soul satisfying food.”

Am I a ramen prodigy? A culinary genius? Not quite (or at all). Both of those delicious ramen dishes were courtesy of Yo-Kai Express, the automated ramen vending machine company that launched a ramen meal kit service last week. Right now, Yo-Kai’s meal kits are only available in parts the Bay Area, but the company was kind enough to overnight me a couple samples to try.

I was eager to see how all this would work for a number of reasons. I’m not the world’s best cook, and have certainly never made real ramen (read: not the bricks of dried noodles+salt you buy at the grocery store). I don’t really like traditional meal kits because they are too much work. And honestly, the Yo-Kai ramen was one of the highlights of my robot food tour of San Francisco last year, and I didn’t want to be disappointed.

Thankfully, the Yo-Kai meal kit came through.

All the ingredients for the two different dishes arrived in a plain box. I was a little concerned because the food wasn’t packed in dry ice or anything, but it was evident that the meats and broths had been shipped frozen. Tucked inside an insulated sleeve, they were still cold to the touch.

The one complaint I had about the meal kit was that it didn’t come with the cooking directions. I had to go to Yo-Kai’s site for those. Whether this was an accident or by design to get me back to menu and order page, I’m not sure.

The ramen kits run between $11 and $12 each, and both dishes were super easy to make. Boil water, add the noodles for a quick heat before draining. Heat up the broth and add the meat, corn, green onions and other ingredients right as it’s coming to a boil. Put everything in a bowl and enjoy.

The two dishes Yo-Kai sent: Black Garlic and Spicy Kimchi were delightful in their own completely different ways. The black garlic had a robust umami flavor with a lot of depth. The Kimchi, for this middle-aged suburban dad, was just the right amount of spicy. Enough to give the dish a punch, but not enough to distract from the flavors of the meal.

Look, I’m not a food critic, nor a ramen expert. I’m writing about this because I think it’s a fascinating move by Yo-Kai. As noted, the company’s main business is automated ramen vending machines. But vending machines are typically located in high-traffic areas like airports and office buildings. With the COVID-19 pandemic forcing shelter-in-place orders, most of those locations aren’t high-traffic anymore. So the company is adapting. If you can’t make it to one of their machines, they’ll deliver the ramen to you, where you can enjoy it at your own social distance.

Those of us living outside the Bay Area are too distant to even get Yo-Kai’s ramen kits for now. And while moving back to California would mean I could get these meal kits all the time, I’m guessing that if Yo-Kai’s meal kit line takes off, they’ll be available up here soon enough.

Get Ramen Delivered to Your Door, Courtesy of Yo-Kai Express’ New Meal Kits

Yo-Kai Express, makers of the automated ramen vending machines, launched a new ramen meal kit delivery service today.

Sadly, the new service is only available in San Francisco, Alameda, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. So if you don’t live in these parts of the Bay Area — no ramen soup for you!

Menu items include Japanese Black Garlic Tonkatsu Ramen, Japanese Asari Ramen, and Korean Spicy Seafood Jjamppong Ramen with most meals costing $10.99 and $11.99. Yo-Kai is also selling add-ons like tea and coffee drinks as well.

Yo-Kai’s menu was actually created by a Michelin-star chef (if you have the chance to try their vending machine, I highly recommend). With the mail order kit, Yo-Kai will send you the pre-portioned ingredients and provides you with the instructions for making the meal.

According to the Yo-Kai store’s website, there is free shipping on orders over $60 and meals ordered before 5 p.m. will deliver the next day between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Meals ordered after 5 p.m. will be delivered in two days.

This is an interesting move for Yo-Kai, given the current state of the world. The company had placed vending machines in high-traffic areas like the SFO airport, the Metreon in downtown San Francisco and other corporate campuses. But given California’s shelter in place order, those locations aren’t so high-traffic any more, and who knows when things will return to the normal level of activity.

Adding a mail order kit option gives Yo-Kai and entirely new line of business catering to people who have to stay at home. They are also carving out a nice lane for themselves by focusing on ramen. It’s like getting a restaurant meal delivered, without paying exorbitant delivery fees (though you do have to cook it).

A Yo-Kai is a Japanese spirit that can appear anywhere. With these new meal kits, Yo-Kais ramen can now magically appear at your doorstep.

Yo-Kai Express Opens up its Automated Hot Ramen Machine at SFO

Yo-Kai Express, which makes hot ramen vending machines, opened up its first airport location last week at the San Francisco International Airport (SFO).

The SFO Twitter account posted a picture of the machine yesterday, and Andy Lin, CEO of Yo-Kai, confirmed to us via Linkedin that the machine went live last week. It’s located in Terminal 3, near gate E4, and from the looks of the picture, it’s right next to the Cafe X robot-barista (more on that in a minute).

Yo-Kai Express is a self-contained machine that serves up bowls of hot ramen noodles in about 45 seconds. The recipes for the ramen were developed by a Michelin-star chef (they are delicious), and they are stored frozen inside the machine. When you order on the touchscreen, a proprietary process re-heats the ramen and serves it up, complete with utensils.

From the SFO picture, this seems to be the latest version of the Yo-Kai machine, which features dual dispensers. Yo-Kai added this second delivery slot to reduce wait times for customers.

Yo-Kai is part of the emerging cohort of high-end vending machines, which also includes Chowbotics, Bake Xpress, Briggo and Cafe X. These companies are re-imagining what a vending machine can be, serving up fresh food at all hours of the day.

As mentioned earlier, it looks as though this new Yo-Kai is parked right next to the Cafe X at SFO. The two were actually neighbors in downtown San Francisco at the Metreon, before Cafe X shuttered its in-city locations.

But this type of food+drink placement is exactly what I wrote about a couple of weeks back. Because automated vending machines and kiosks have a smaller physical footprint, you can create a 24-hour, mini-food court in smaller corners an airport or hospital or any high-traffic location. Yo-Kai and Cafe X should be talking with one another to do cross-promotions (buy a bowl of ramen, get a coupon for an ice tea!).

These high-end vending machines will probably have a slight adoption curve at first as people get used to the idea of fresh food coming from an automated machine. People are more used to getting a Twix bar from a vending machine than a craft latte or Black Garlic Oil Tonkotsu Ramen. But that will change and soon there will be all types of cuisine waiting for us as we wait for our planes.

Will New Regulations Rain on the Rise of Vending Machines?

From the hot ramen dispensing Yo-Kai Express to fresh salads whipped up by Chowbotics’ Sally, we are entering a golden age of vending machines. Tucked into just about any corner of a busy building and operating autonomously 24 hours a day, vending machines are poised to disrupt what and how we eat. That is, unless regulators disrupt the rise of vending machines first.

The New York Times posted a story yesterday about how Farmers Fridge, which dispenses fresh salads in jars, sparked a change in the way New York City will regulate newer, high-tech vending machines.

The crux of the problem is that like so many things, municipal regulations lag behind technological innovations. Laws on the books around vending machines were made back when vending machines were just pre-packaged snacks and sodas. But vending machines nowadays dispense all manner of fresh food like salads and açai bowls, which are more susceptible to foodborne illnesses.

Given this new vector for potential food poisoning, New York City’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene stepped in and actually forced all Farmers Fridges in NYC to temporarily shut down while the city figured it out, which the two parties eventually did. From the NYT article:

In negotiations over the last month, the department and the company have agreed that each Farmer’s Fridge machine will be treated, for the most part, as a restaurant — or “food service establishment,” per the health code. Every machine will require a permit, inspections and the same kind of letter grade posted everywhere from McDonald’s to Le Bernardin.

Food vending machines already jump through a lot of regulatory hoops just to be able to serve food in the first place. There are plenty of rules about the construction of these machines that include using food safe materials and not having angled corners (so bacteria doesn’t build up). And as Yo-Kai and Briggo have learned, there is also another layer of compliance for things like access for the visually impaired that must be met when installing machines at airports.

But NYC taking note of these newfangled vending machines could spark a new wave of rules across different cities that startups must comply with. City governments, always on the lookout for new revenue, probably won’t pass up the chance to impose new fines on high-tech vending machines. Companies like Chowbotics and Fresh Bowl in particular, both of which dispense fresh salads, will probably face greater scrutiny, but new administrative procedures are likely to impact companies like Yo-Kai and Basil Street as well.

As long as the regulations don’t become too onerous, this new scrutiny is probably a good thing. Even Farmers Fridge expressed empathy for NYC regulators in the Times piece, saying “New York regulators genuinely seem to be acting out the desire to keep people safe and understand a new business model. You always have to manage the chaos when you’re doing something new and different.”

Move fast and break things may work for software startups, but when it comes to the food we eat, slowing down and making sure it’s safe is probably a good thing.